Graveyard Shift
by Leraiv Snape
Summary: Set during Night Watch. When in Ankh-Morpork of his past, Vimes sleeps with a young Vetinari. When launched back into the Ankh-Morpork of his own time, he has to deal with the repercussions. Warning: Implied Slash


Disclaimer: _Discworld _and all of its brilliance belongs to Terry Pratchett. I am making no money here, I just enjoy writing.

A/N: This short was inspired by and is a companion piece to _Pseudopolis_ by Resonant, which can be found at the following archive: /works/58721. In _Pseudopolis_, Sam is in the role of John Keel from Pratchett's _Night Watch_ when a young Vetinari approaches him with a proposition. They sleep together and then, of course, Vimes has to come home. Resonant suggested reading the final conversation between Lord Vetinari and Commander Vimes in _Night Watch_ after reading her fic. I did. What follows are my thoughts and adaptations on that conversation.

Graveyard Shift

'Good evening, Your Grace.'

Vimes stiffened at the sound of that voice. All grown up now, with none of the hitches, none of the emotion, none of the _life_ the younger version had possessed. This was all The Ruler. None of the passion.

Admittedly, Vimes had been able to read the younger version because of his extensive experience with the older one, but still…

'_I want you to go to bed with me.'_

'How long were _you _there?' he demanded roughly, spinning and trying to knock the request of the younger Vetinari from his head.

'Oh, some little while,' Vetinari replied smoothly, detaching himself from shadow and gliding forward. His eyes were fastened on the Duke, sparing no glance for the murderer bound on the ground. Vimes forced himself not to look away as the image of young Vetinari's face – the gentle fondness of a lover hovering around the corners of his eyes – flashed in front of him. 'Like you, I prefer to come alone and…contemplate.'

His quiet tone, bereft of command or cool arrogance, mixed with the slight softening of his pale blue eyes to make the Watch Commander wonder just what, exactly, Vetinari was contemplating.

_How long has he known?_ Vimes wondered. _When did I become the man he recognized from that single encounter? Was it the day we were locked in a cell while a dragon rampaged around the city? Or the day you appointed me Commander of the Watch? Or was it just now, looking me in the face after all these years? _Does_ he know? Or is it too impossible to credit?_

'You were very quiet,' Vimes murmured, glancing down at Carcer.

'Is that a crime, Your Grace?' The mockery was back.

'And you heard—?' Vimes pressed.

'A very neat arrest. Congratulations, Your Grace.'

Vimes shrugged. 'I suppose so.'

'On the birth of your son, I meant,' Vetinari said gently. At this, Vimes's eyes went to the ice-blue gaze of the Patrician once more, and _saw_.

Vetinari, _his _Vetinari, remembered. The look in his eyes was distantly watchful, as if he was sorting through three decades, putting it together. And the watchman could see that the Patrician was also aware that if he were correct, the incident had occurred a great deal more recently for Vimes.

'Yes…' he heard himself say distantly, 'Oh. Of course. Yes. Well…thank you.'

'A healthy lad, I am given to understand.' Vetinari sounded almost cautious.

'We'd have been just as happy with a daughter,' Vimes quickly replied, trying to pick up the pieces of a should-be-familiar world that had been shattered in more ways than one by his trip backwards.

'Quite so. These are modern times, after all,' Vetinari allowed. Silence descended. It was almost…comfortable. Vimes hastily lifted Carcer over his shoulder to break it, and Vetinari turned to match his stride, both men starting across the damp grass of the graveyard.

'You know,' the Patrician began after a few minutes, 'it has often crossed my mind that those men deserve a proper memorial of some sort.'

'Oh yes? In one of the main squares, perhaps?'

'Yes, that would be a good idea.'

'Perhaps a tableau in bronze? All seven of them raising the flag, perhaps?'

'Bronze, yes,' Vetinari mused.

'Really? And some sort of inspiring slogan?' Vimes's voice was entirely too bright. Vetinari knew he was being wound up, but he had _invented _this game and the Commander of the Watch would not beat him at it now.

'Yes, indeed. Something like, perhaps, 'They Did The Job They Had To Do'?'

'_No,'_ Vimes said fiercely, one hand snatching out to stop the Patrician, curling around his bicep. 'How dare you? How _dare _you! At this time! In this place! They did the job they _didn't_ have to do, and they died doing it, and you can't give them anything. Do you understand? They fought for those who'd been abandoned, they fought for one another, and they were betrayed. Men like them always are. What good would a statue be? It'd just inspire new fools to believe they're going to be heroes. They wouldn't want that. Just let them be. _Forever_.'

There was more in his speech than the anger for those who had died under his command. More in his touch than the frustration that there was no way of truly recompensing the fallen.

The men froze, Vimes's fingers still wrapped around Vetinari's slender arm. The Assassin always carried weapons, but he reached for none now, nor did he betray surprise. But he did reach around with his free hand and apply pressure to Carcer's jugular until the watchful prisoner passed out.

'This is a conversation that should be had privately, Sergeant.'

_Sergeant…_ 'You knew? You bloody well knew, didn't you?'

'Not until, oh, one second ago,' Vetinari replied quietly. 'I couldn't be sure. I had, after all, watched you age, promoted you myself…but as you slid into the role of Watch Commander, I began to have my suspicions. And tonight…with the scar across your eye, Your Grace, I became almost certain. But I had to know for sure.'

Vimes hadn't moved. His face might as well have been carved from stone. 'Now you're sure. So…what?' He could hear the lifelessness in his voice. Thirty years ago, Havelock Vetinari, a young Assassin-to-be had talked him into bed. But the child had become the Patrician, and here Vimes had wife, a son, and responsibilities.

'This is not a subject on which I can dictate to you, Commander,' Vetinari answered and his carefully-neutral voice bordered on compassionate. 'When it comes to running the city, I expect you to obey my good orders and identify and disobey my bad ones. But this…this is not something I can command from you or for you. It is yours to choose, as much as it is mine.'

Vimes felt his jaw lock. He wanted to spit in the man's face. He wanted to sneer and tell him he wanted nothing to do with it, that Vetinari _did not_ have this power, alongside so many others, over him…but the words would not come. He'd already poured out his grief, confusion and frustration – both over those he had watched die _again_, and his suddenly strange and conflicting desires surrounding the Patrician, and, rage subsided, other emotions began to clamor.

He had _never _wanted to sleep with the man before him. _Never _thought about it. The very idea had never crossed his mind before the younger Vetinari had so artlessly approached him. And yet…here he was, and for the first – probably the only – time, he knew that Vetinari was speaking to him as an equal. As a man, as if their actions in a not-too-distant past had leveled the playing field. Once again, Vetinari was dependent upon _his_ answer. No hidden orders, no silently communicated commands. This equality wouldn't last 'til morning, wouldn't see the breaking dawn, but here, now, it was given…

Given in the acknowledgement that what had been wrought couldn't be undone. Vimes saw his life spooling backwards across decades of service, dozens – hundreds – of encounters with the man before him, times he had saved Vetinari's life regardless of the risk, times that the Patrician had saved his in subtler ways, had _raised_ his from the gutter to the second most powerful man in the city.

As much as he protested, what had they been doing for _years_?

Curiosity, the bastard that had fuelled this situation in the first place, entered.

Could he make _this _Vetinari, the one Vimes – a man absolutely against class and ownership – thought of in some primal way as _his _Vetinari, cry out under him? Would the Patrician say 'Please' in that guileless tone? Would he allow Vimes to see the whole of his body, uncovered, which his younger self had been so endearingly uncertain about? Had he gained in skill? Or, underneath all that black, would Vimes still find the raw passion of the untapped Assassin that had approached him at Dr. Lawn's?

Perhaps it would be the Patrician who held the upper hand this time. Perhaps it would be him, Sir Samuel Vimes, who did the begging…

He had actually dropped Carcer and spun the Patrician to face him, letting the knuckles of his free hand brush that pale cheek, relishing in the sound of Lord Vetinari's sudden almost-gasp, the slight widening of those eyes…

And the Watchman, the one who guarded the Beast, appeared.

'_Congratulations, Your Grace…on the birth of your son…'_ Suddenly the curiosity was leashed and tied, leaving behind it a dull ache of something desperately wanted, deeply desired, and never to be had. Vimes dropped both of his hands, and took a step backward.

'I…,' He couldn't say the word _Sybil._ Not at this time or in this place. 'The duchess,' he substituted huskily. 'I…can't.' To say he didn't want to would be a lie, and Sam Vimes wouldn't waste either's time with it. Vetinari had a habit of knowing the truth even when one lied to oneself.

Vimes caught the swallow, the flitting of regret in the blue gaze, and then the man in front of him was his master, his commander, the only man in Ankh-Morpork that outranked him, and the only man in the city he would follow into hell's jaws if they opened.

'Naturally, Sir Samuel.' His tone, like his face, was now carefully blank. The Commander of the Watch observed him for a few seconds more, then bent to lift Carcer's prone form. When he straightened, Lord Vetinari looked completely at ease, as if the preceding few minutes – as if the night yawning at them from three decades ago – were of no consequence. His next words seemed a non-sequiter:

'As one man to another, Commander, I must ask you: did you ever wonder why I wore the lilac?'

'Yeah. I wondered.'

'But you never asked.'

'No,' Vimes replied shortly. 'I never asked. It's a flower. Anyone can wear a flower.'

'At this time? In this place?'

_You're the Patrician. No one would argue with you. _'Tell me, then.'

'Then I'll recall the day I was sent on an urgent errand. I had to save the life of a man. Not a usual errand for an Assassin, although, in fact, I had already saved it once before.'

Vimes gave him a look. 'You'd shot a man who was aiming a crossbow?'

'Yes, I have an eye for the…unique. But now I was fighting time. The streets were blocked. Chaos and confusion were everywhere, and it wasn't even as if I knew where he could be found. In the end, I took to the rooftops. And thus I came at last to Cable Street, where there was a different sort of confusion.'

'Tell me what you saw,' Vimes ordered. The Patrician slanted a sideways glance at him.

'I saw a man I admired, a man who had taught me much in a short time, charge the leader of the Cable Street thugs. I saw Carcer…vanish. And I saw a man called John Keel die. Or at least, I saw him dead.' He shrugged. 'I joined the fight. I snatched up a lilac bloom from a fallen man and, I have to say, held it in my mouth. I'd like to think I made some difference; I certainly killed four men, although I take no particular pride in that. They were thugs, bullies. No real skill. Besides, their leader had apparently fled, and what morale they had had gone with him. The men with the lilac, I have to say, fought like tigers. Not skillfully, I'll admit, but when _they _saw that _their _leader was down they took the other side to pieces. Astonishing.'

'Where is this leading?' Vimes demanded.

'Nowhere, Commander. What could I prove? And to what end would I prove it?'

'If this is all to…' Vimes waved an arm about vaguely, not quite certain what he meant.

'_This _is not 'all to' anything, Sir Samuel,' Vetinari replied quietly. 'I have already said that I will not dictate orders to you in this regard. Thirty years ago, I told you that I knew you had a secret – though I didn't know what it was. Now, standing here today, not only has that secret been resolved, but you know one of mine. One of the more important ones, perhaps. Certainly one of the ones that helped me rise. And that has not been the least because somewhere, somehow, I recognized John Keel in you. I told you that night that things got less intolerably foolish where you were. That has been your hallmark as Commander of the Watch, Vimes. You have turned this city on its head in two timelines – and in both, Ankh-Morpork runs the better for it.'

He stopped at the edge of the graveyard, beyond which the lights of the city beckoned. 'Let us leave the dead alone. But for you, Commander, as a little gift on the occasion of the birth of—'

'There's nothing I want,' Vimes cut him off quickly. Not gifts. Not now. Not when the only thing he wanted, what he hated himself for wanting and could not keep himself from longing for, was the man standing right beside him. 'You can't promote me any further,' he continued, hurrying to mask his traitorous thoughts. 'There's nothing left to bribe me with. I've got more than I deserve—' _isn't _that_ the truth_, part of him jeered, _standing here with his lordship when Sybil and Young Sam are at home,_ '—the Watch is working well. We don't even need a new bloody dartboard—'

'In memory of the late John Keel—' Vetinari started softly.

'I _warned _you—'

'—I can give you back Treacle Mine Road.' In his voice hung a finality that Vimes knew closed not only the subject of honoring the fallen, but their own, now-tumultuous past. It was to be shut away, a piece of their personal history left, unforgotten, but untouchable.

But _they_ would always know. And they would have to continue on as Commander of the City Watch and Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, knowing what was there. Knowing they would not touch it, or prod it, or wake it.

'_Please…'_

'It could all be put back, Commander. In memory of John Keel, a man who in a few short days changed the lives of many and, perhaps, saved some sanity in a mad world. Why, in a few months you could light the lamp over the door…'

'We could do with the space, it's true,' Vimes conceded. To be given back Treacle Mine Road, at this time, in this place…it would forever bear the mark of young Vetinari's breathless and impassioned face, black hair splayed against the white of Dr. Lawn's sheets, the gentle hand that had moved Vimes's dripping hair aside after their fierce love-making…a hidden monument within a private one that would receive little notice anyway.

'I can see you like the sound of it already,' the Patrician said. 'And if you'd care to come along to my office tomorrow, we can settle the—'

'There's a trial tomorrow.' Vimes pulled Carcer up farther on his shoulder, almost like a shield.

'Ah, yes, of course. And it will be a fair one.'

'It'd better be. I want this bastard to hang, after all.'

'Well, then, afterward we could—'

_No. Not so soon. I have to come back to myself first. I have to find distance between me and your flushed cheeks, the sound of your voice as you surrendered to me, the eyes blazing with passion, staring at me across thirty years, the same damn eyes you _still _have…_

'Afterward I'm going home to my family for a while.'

'Good! Well said,' Vetinari allowed without missing a beat. 'You have a gift, I have noticed, for impressive oratory.' A note of warning touched the controlled voice, and Vimes tilted his head.

But one more question had to be asked:

'_I think this is the place where the departing swain elicits a promise from his lover not to forget him.' Young Vetinari said it lightly, easily, as if the words were part of a script that had to be spoken._

'_Believe me,' Vimes had whispered, 'there is very little danger of that.'_

'Did you?' Vimes asked quietly. It had to be said here and now, before they left the graveyard and allowed the dead to swallow their memories. 'Remember?'

Vetinari held the eyes of the man before him, and, for a moment, allowed Vimes to see through the construct of the Patrician and into the reality of Havelock Vetinari. It was gift none had been granted. 'For some years. And then his memory was submerged, as the mind will do, to surrender that space to Sir Samuel Vimes, Commander of the City Watch.' As Vimes stared, rattled by the confession, the Patrician closed the door on the man, and the unruffled ruler gazed at the Duke from unconcerned eyes.

'At this time, Commander, and in this place,' he reminded him.

'That's sergeant-at-arms. For now.' A faint smile graced Vetinari's face as they exited the graveyard without another word. As his boots touched the cobblestones on the outside, Sam Vimes knew that life would continue as it ever had. The Patrician faded into the deep shadows of the buildings and disappeared, as if their conversation, the whole of their encounter, belonged to the past along with the several days Vimes had spent there ensuring that history stayed happened and the present went nowhere.

He had wondered, standing in Lawn's spare bedroom, what _his_ Vetinari had wanted. Now Vimes knew. And he knew it didn't matter. They served the city. Ankh-Morpork was a jealous mistress. She allowed for no others.

Hoisting the unconscious Carcer higher on his shoulder, he headed for the Yard.

There would be a trial tomorrow. But tonight, Sam Vimes would go home, kiss his wife, and introduce himself properly to his son.

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A/N: Any dialogue you recognize comes from pages 333-337 of _Night Watch_. The lines in italics are taken from _Pseudopolis_, as is Vetinari's line about 'things being less intolerably foolish where you are'. As usual, please let me know what you think!


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